The Sweet Escape Creative Studio

{Alt Summit Part 1: The business cards}

Here we are folks, Part 1 of my Alt Summit review. I know there’s lots of people who really want me to share this amazing experience but I also know that not everyone wants to relive every moment so I’m going to try really hard to keep it to three parts, the biz cards, what I learned, and the unreal parties & decor.

Your business card at Alt is the equavilent to what you wear to a fashion show. Yes, people want to stand out, will make judgements (it’s human nature, don’t judge), and will ask you where you got them printed.

I collected over 75 (!) cards – all people that I actually had some interaction with. Things definitely get a little crazy during the conference so I waited until I got home to sit down and go through them and look up everyone’s blog.

I guarantee you that you will see the most creative business cards you’ve ever seen at an Alt conference. It’s not a competition, but you want to stand out from the rest. So with this being said, if you haven’t yet got business cards made for your business, why not check out companies similar to Metal Kards and get started. It’s all about growing your business and networking, which you can do a lot better with when you have business cards. No matter what industry people work in, having a business card is very important. Whether you decide to get a well designed business card for your law firm, business cards for a new restaurant or are considering starting a photography business, you never know who you’ll meet along the way. So having business cards made will hopefully start the networking process and make it a lot easier.

I definitely saw a few themes this year but overall a collection of wonderfully creative cards. Seeing all these has definitely made me want to step up my game when it comes to my business cards. I am definitely going to look and speak to some professionals from companies like kaizenprint.ie and hopefully I will be able to get my ideas down on a card after getting so much inspiration from everyone else. It’s all about making the best first impression you can. I even did a quick search into something like Elev8, so I have an idea as to how I can make my business card stand out, just like the ones I saw at the conference.

Here’s my attempt at putting them into a few categories. If you don’t see yours here, it doesn’t mean I didn’t like it! (it just means it was so unique it wasn’t part of a group ;) ….or we didn’t have the pleasure of meeting)

First up are all the letterpress cards. A beautiful letterpress card will always get a little envy (ohhhh, letterpress, sooo nice). Gold foil stamping was a trend as well as colour on the edges of the cards.

alt summit business cards3Letterpress cards: 1 / Say Yes 2 / I heart Cleveland 3 / Charming Details 4 / Caravan Shoppe 5 / Bree Johnson, Classicly Quirky 6 / A Thousand Threads 7 / Design Lotus

alt summit letterpress business card

alt summit business cards

Then there were the beautifully illustrated group, which I particularly love. Probably because I can’t illustrate.

alt summit business cardsIllustration: 1 / Frock Files 2 / Tinsel & Trim 3 / Edith and Kaye 4 / Fraser & Parsley 5 / Girl Friday

Some people’s cards came in pretty little packages that held little surprises.

alt summit biz cardsPretty packages: 1 / Mindy Joy Media 2 / Kori Clark 3 / Something Turquoise 4 / French Knot Studios

And then some people got all creative and generous and included little gifts or something super cool with their cards. Just in case you’re wondering, that hole punch & ring is so you can punch all the cards you get and keep them on the ring. Genius! Except for the fact that I didn’t want to ruin the pretty cards with a hole until after I did this post for you. Now I will punch away.

alt summit creative biz cardsCool stuff: 1 / Willowday 2 / Snowdrop & Company 3 / Fletcher & Fox 4 / Elita 5 / LuLu the Baker 6 / Carly Lane Morgan 7 / Jacolyn Murphy 8 / Legal Miss Sunshine 9 / Paige Hewlett

alt summit biz cards details 3Pretty incredble huh? I told you they would be creative. So if you ever make it to the Alt conference, don’t just leave your business card as a last minute detail. It’s part of your brand! Here’s some great card ideas I posted just before I hit up the BlogPodium conference in my hometown last year. You can see what my card looked like. Nothing flashy BUT I will say it’s well designed.

TheSweetEscape

10 responses to “{Alt Summit Part 1: The business cards}”

  4. There are so many bloggers I met at ALT but seeing that there were so many amazing people and cards I still didn’t reach is mind boggling! Thanks for posting about your faves here, I love looking at them, as I know that everyone put so much effort and creativity into their designs. Still need to weed through my bag of cards this weekend!

    • Oh, THANK YOU!!!! It’s just so much fun to come by and see your talents — not only was it wonderful to meet you — but, now I, too, have to give you a big thanks! Thank you so much for including me in this superstar collection of creatives! I agree with several of your commenters, as well — I thought I took in so much at ALT but, now see that there was SO much more to take in, too! AND… thankfully, there was another who, too, wasn’t on top of her unpacking as well as you, either! I’m still unpacking and holding on to the wonderful memories and creative goods! Super list — I will peruse! So much creativity!
      … and last, just one big pleasure to meet you!

    • Thanks Bree! You’ll be the first to know if I venture into the land of video design workshops :)